Happy Birthday to Leah!

February 21st was my 22nd Birthday, and the only one I will probably ever have in Russia so we had to celebrate. The day before I had been suffering with a wicked sore throat and was having difficulty talking so I took a sick day from classes (don't worry I got myself all caught up already) and stayed home to rest with the hope that I would be feeling better on Saturday. Luckily, this is exactly what happened.
Saturday morning, we all walked to Lenta (which is kind of like Costco in that it has absolutely everything, you just don't have to buy in bulk) where we bought a few groceries, sushi for lunch, a birthday cake and a bottle of "Soviet Champagne." A quick side note: it is actually illegal for this champagne to be called a champagne because it is not from Champagne, France . . . but oh well this is Russia. Plus it costs the equivalent of about $4 Canadian and tastes fantastic. While in Lenta I got a phone call from my best friend Chris, so I wandered around the store trailing my roommates and excitedly chatting away with him. Sadly for him it was 3 am, but it was fantastic to hear a friendly voice and to finally be able to explain to him in more detail what life has been like in Russia! I think he is living vicariously through me and is dreaming of his own trips to Europe even more so now.
After trekking home, and eating our sushi lunch, we headed to Nevsky Prospect (downtown) to see if we could take a city bus tour. However, when we got to the little kiosks for the numerous bus tours of the city, we had already missed the Enlgish tours of the day. Theoretically we could have taken a tour in Russian, but our vocabularies aren't overly great yet, and we wanted to be sure that we could take in as much info about the sites as we could, so we decided to wait and take a tour in English on another day.
When this initial plan didn't pan out, Ross, Laura and I headed for the Church-On-Spilled-Blood. It was fantastic! So glad we went to see it instead. Reminder: in a past blog I mentioned a bit of this church's history, it was built as a monument for tsar Alexander II who had been, before his assassination, attempting to set up a constitutional monarchy. It was actually built on the spot where, while he was driving through a square in his carriage, he was bombed. To this day, despite the floor throughout the rest of the church being made to look like a huge mosaic carpet out of various colours of marble (or maybe granite?), there has been left a large hole in the floor where underneath you can still see the old and slightly misplaced cobblestones which were dislodged in the explosion. On the walls of the church, covering all 6560 square meters (unsure of the conversion into feet sorry), are mosaic images of saints, biblical events and characters. It is absolutely stunning! I cannot imagine the amount of time it must have taken the artists to create such beautiful images and scenes all out of tiny, individually placed tiles. From floor to ceiling we saw images including: numerous orthadox saints; scenes from the bible such as: Joseph, Mary and Jesus' flight into Egypt; the Burning Bush, the Sermon on the Mount, Christ walking on water and healing people, the Crucifixion, the Resurrection, and on and on. On the ceilings of the domes, were the faces of Mary the Mother of God, John the Baptist, Christ, etc. The pictures are stunning, but in person this church is like nothing I have ever seen before. In my opinion, Alexander II could not have wished for a more beautiful monument.
After the Church-On-Spilled-Blood, the three of us who had gone to the church met up with Jessi and we all went together to an Italian restaurant for dinner (really great food, and nice wine!). Then, following dinner, we headed home where we sat down to eat cake, drink our champagne and toast with some vodka (this is Russia afterall). Heather, another Canadian student studying here with us, popped in to bring me some chocolates, and so she joined us as well. Jessi and Laura bought me a Jasmine plant, which is so fitting, because almost everyone knows how crazy I am about plants and for my last three birthdays now I have been given at least 1 every year. Sorry Ross, but the Crazy Plant Lady lives on, even in Russia. *(Question for Jeana: How are the plants? Ross especially inquires about the shamrock plant, the only one he loves.) Ross bought me a fantastic set of nesting dolls (matroshki): the largest one is of Lenin, inside him Stalin, inside that Khrushchev, inside that Gorbachev, and finally Putin. It skips Brezhnev, Andropov, Chernenko, and Yeltsin, but oh well! It is a gorgeous set, all handpainted and looks far nicer than some of the mass produced ones we have seen in some of the shops. (Also from Ross, the Planet Earth collection, in Russian and Enlgish yay! so we can try watching it and see how much of it we can understand in Russian). - - - All in all, a great 22nd birthday, and one I certainly won't be able to forget anytime soon. P.S. thanks to everyone who passed along birthday wishes via my Mom, and happy belated birthday to Nichole, hope your 18th was fantastic(did you get my message cuz?).

Love from Leah

Ok I am back to the history now, but this is technically school related too because it is the history of the buildings which make up the Smolny Insitute. Our part of the school is just one wing of a larger building which is part of the Smolny Insitute, is called the Centre of Russian Language and Culture, and it serves as a centre for internationals from all across the world to come to learn Russian. The building was built between 1806 and 1808 and was initially a convent as well as a school for young aristocratic girls. However, in 1917 it became the first headquarters for the Bolshevik Central Committee. This is the building from which Lenin and Trotsky executed the Revolution, and afterwards ran the Soviet government. It was also where, in 1934 Sergei Kirov (who was essentially Stalin’s right hand man) the Leningrad Party Chief was assassinated. This didn’t actually occur in the building where we study, but one of the other buildings which makes up the institute. Today, the St. Petersburg Governor uses that part of the campus as their main office. It is so fascinating to me to be going to school every day in a building which I have heard about in my Soviet History classes at UVic, and to be wandering the same halls as some very famous Soviet leaders.
In the centre courtyard of the Smolny campus, and right outside the doors of our wing of the school, is the Smolny Cathedral. This baroque style cathedral is a beautiful sky blue colour and has golden-onion domes typical of Russian churches. We have not been inside yet, because lately there has seemed to have been a lot of construction going on inside, but we intend to go in someday soon to see the interior. As a final note, this cathedral, like many of the other historic churches in St. Petersburg, is not regularly used. It no longer has a congregation and regular services, but special events and services can be held their occasionally because it has been properly blessed, etc.

Musuem Madness

The Hermitage – aka the Winter Palace, stands along the Neva River in the centre of St. Petersburg and has on its other side Palace Square. The square has in its centre a huge monument dedicated to the Russian defeat of Napoleon in 1812 and is where Bloody Sunday took place in 1905 (which began the 1905 revolution), and again in 1917 was the scene of the storming of the Winter Palace during the October Revolution! (so much history) The Palace itself was the principle home of Peter the Great. During the reign of Catherine the Great (who purchased boatloads of art) it was turned into a gallery, later opened to the public during the reign of Nicolas I. Beginning the October Revolution, the famous cruiser the Aurora fired a blank shot signaling Lenin’s Red Guards to attack. A bit of damage was done to the building, but very quickly the Provisional Government who had been occupying the building was arrested. Today, the Hermitage is made up of five linked buildings and contains ridiculous amounts of art. We spent several hours there and still only saw a fraction of what is on display. Because we have Russian student identification, we get in for free so we intend to go back. We saw only one half of the first floor, which houses the Egyptian artifacts, and then Greek and Roman art. Although we found the exhibits interesting, there is far too much to take in, hundreds of artifacts and pieces of art. However, I very much enjoyed looking through the numerous rooms which contained the Greek artworks. Last semester I took a course on Greek Mythology and so I tested myself to see if I could correctly guess which mythological figure each marble statue was before reading the plaques. We saw several Aphrodites, Eros, many Apollos, Artemis, Zeus, Dionysus and on and on! It was fantastic. What we were both most interested in, instead of the art, was the architecture of the building. The rooms themselves are giant works of art impossible to describe. Every room was different from the last, with marble tiled floors, huge pillars, elaborately carved/sculpted/plastered ceilings, or with mosaic painted ceilings . . . absolutely unbelievable and there are hundreds and hundreds of rooms! I cannot wait to go back to see more of the building, to see the European Art (there are artworks by Rembrant, Raphael, Leonardo Da Vinci, Michelangelo, Monet, Picasso, Renoir, Van Gough, Matisse and so many others who are less known to me but I am sure are just as remarkable). It is absolutely awing to be in the presence of some of these artworks (ones from Greece which were sculpted nearly 2000 years ago, ones from famous artists like those I mentioned above) all while in one of the most historical buildings in all of Russia. Every square inch of the place is bursting with history (I am in heaven): the ceremonial hall (which has no less than 28 chandeliers), the apartments of the last tsar of Russia Nicholas II and his family (including the mythical Anastasia), the Jordan Staircase (google it! Trust me), the diningroom where the Bolsheviks arrested the Provisional Government (how I love early Soviet history), the Great Hall where massive parties were hosted, the throne room, the cathedral where many of the royals were married, and other rooms which Peter the Great, Catherine the Great and a host of other Russian royals ate, slept, entertained, etc. I could spend years wandering the halls of the Hermitage!

Why isnt this working?

Just for Dad - About our Classes

I hadn’t really realized until tonight when I spoke with my parents and Dad happened to ask “So do you guys go to school?” that I haven’t written about our classes or our school yet. I have been really caught up with all of the history and the sites here that I had completely forgotten. So this is for you Dad (I don’t enjoy school as much as the site seeing but I promise that I am attending actual classes here):
Firstly, when we arrived here (two days after we got here actually), we took a placement test at the school (the Smolny Institute of Russian Language and Culture) which placed us into various classes based on our level of knowledge in the language. Ross and I are both in the same class, which is made up of all Canadian students who have been studying Russian for 4-5 years.
SMI (an acronym for Mass Media), is taught to us by Mikhail Arkadyevich Krudyshev and is a course in which we read newspaper and other media articles. We are given these articles only in Russia, and we read them in class and for the most difficult words and phrases our teacher will translate them into English for us (Mikhail Arkadyevich’s English is really good). So far we have read two articles, one about the fears which Russians have, and another on what is most important to Russians. I find this class, and this teacher the most interesting, because we learn about the modern views of the Russian people, and also because Mikhail gives us great personal insight into the culture of Russia. He tells us many little anecdotes: about how you could determine which vodkas to purchase in the former Soviet Union, about what the laws are for drinking in public, about the current healthcare system here, how the city is still very inaccessible for people with physical disabilities. . . in general he has, apart from instructing us on current events, given us a lot of practical insights into Russia.
Grammar is taught to us by Marina Vadimovna Kuznetsova who is very sweet and has also given us tips on how to prevent our things from being stolen on the metro, etc. In her class we practice the strict rules of the Russian language. In Russian verbs are conjugated differently depending on who/what you are talking about. Ex. In English I would say: I like to swim. You like to swim. They like to swim. But in Russian the verb to swim is pronounced plavat – but to say I swim you would use plavau, you swim: plavaesh, they swim plavayot (sorry difficult to explain). The same is true for nouns and adjectives as well, the endings on words change in 6 different ways depending on how you are using them (this is called Cases, depending on what case you use, the ending of a word will change, and there are different endings within each case for masculine words, feminine words, neutral words, and plural words). Enough of that technical talk. Essentially we learn how to form sentences in Russian in the proper way – it’s complicated.
Conversation, is what we need the most help in, and is taught to us by Nina Petrovna Koloyartseva. She is a very interesting older woman, who tells us stories of what it was like to live through the Blockade of Leningrad during WWII. She has been teaching at our school for 52 years! She has seen so much history during these years too, she was born when this city was Leningrad, lived through WWII, lived through the reign of Stalin all the way up to the collapse of the Soviet Union, and now lives in the new Russia which must seem so opposite to what her country looked like before. At any rate, in her class we practice speaking Russian by chatting about various topics. We have chatted about movies and she taught us specific phrases and questions to use for; we talked about the city of St. Petersburg and our cities in Canada and asked questions about their sites, their industries, their populations, etc.; we have also covered other things, like how to greet people and how to give complements, etc. etc. It is a bit difficult to absorb, but luckily we don’t cover too much too fast, it seems that she understands that if we repeat things for a few classes in a row, then it will become easier for us to remember them.
Literature, which we only have once a week (Grammar and Conversation we have 3 times a week, because they are the most important), is taught to us by Anastasia Sergeievna Grosheva and as you may have guessed, in her class we read Russian literature. Short stories, and poems; so far only a short story by Bunin and a poem by Alexander Blok. We read these in Russian, and then try to talk about the themes, symbols and such of them. This is rather difficult since we have never done this before in Russian and our vocabulary is a bit limited in this area, but our teacher seems to be fairly forgiving and generally gets the idea of what we are trying to say, even if we can’t quite get it out using the proper grammar.
Phonetics, which we also have once a week, is taught to us by Marina Alexandrova Ivanova. In this class, she teaches us the proper way to pronounce Russian words and phrases, and usually we read things to her and she will correct our pronunciation, or she will ask us questions and we will try to answer as best we can, and again she will tell us what we are saying wrong. This course is a little more difficult for us I think partly because our teacher at home was very forgiving about our pronunciation so we have developed a few bad habits I think. We have been saying many words in the wrong way for the last few years and it is a bit tricky to re-learn them.
Lastly, we are also taking a Film Course. Our teacher is Alexander (I can never remember his patronymic name, which is bad and I will explain later) Victorov and in his class we watch short film segments and then talk about them. We discuss the things the characters say, the subtle cultural things, and what we like about the movie etc. . . Again this is a course where we are made to practice speaking (which all our teachers agree is the area where we have the most room to improve). It is nice though, because we are learning some more colloquial expressions from the movies and from Alexander himself. He too, like some of our other teachers tells us great stories about what life was like in the Soviet Union in comparison to today, and talks to us about how regular Russians speak and think.
Patronymic Names: In Russia, a person’s second name, unlike our middle names, is not just a second given name that their parents have choosen for them. Instead they have what is called a patronymic name, which essentially tells people what their father’s name was. So using our teachers for example Mikhail Arkadyevich’s father was called Arkady . . . Marina Alexandrovna’s father was Alexander and so on. When we are in class, and in general when someone is addressing someone of authority or with politeness, they will call the person by their first name and their patronymic name, this is why it is bad that I have forgotten Alexander’s patronymic name. I would never want to call him only Alexander because it would be disrespectful. Someday soon I will simply have to apologize and ask him to repeat it for me, or spell it for me.

Love from Leah and Ross too (I seem to be monopolizing the posts lately)

Peeping Tom

Ever since we have gotten here, Ross and I have been having this issue, with having an unwanted spectator peering in on our day to day comings and goings. Even though we are up on the eighth floor where you think you would be safe, he is constantly coming to peer in through our windows to see what we are up to.
Explanation: His name is now Marshal and his is a pigeon! Sorry for the slight melodrama of my introduction but somehow it seemed necessary to fully drag my readers in. After all, this is a story about a simple pigeon and had I disclosed that at first, I may have lost your attention. Anyway, I have named him Marshal and his is a red-eyed, dark grey-coloured pigeon, with a crescent moon shaped white mark at the edge of his beak and he loves to sit on our window sill and while pretending to not pay attention to what we are doing, occasionally crane his little neck, and stand tall enough, so that he can peer in through our window at us! The little snoop has been spotted now about 4 or 5 times going through this routine, probably whistling to himself and pretending to look out over the park below us, but really he is there to monitor us (or marshal us, hence his name) . . . perhaps he is former KGB? We were able to snap a couple of pictures of him on the last sighting of him so I will attach one, it’s not very clear because of the grime on our windows, but you will get the idea.
Now that I am on the topic of animals, it might interest some people to know: that aside from the occasional smaller bird, pigeons have been the only “wildlife” we have seen in St. Petersburg. I guess maybe because they are hearty scavengers who can survive the winter here, and probably since any other birds that might ordinarily live here are all south for the winter in Sochi or some other such paradise on the Black Sea. At any rate, just a little observation. We have however seen many, many dogs! For some reason, everyone here has one, and one of our professors explains that it is because a) no one had enough money or food to be able to have dogs before, so they are kind of a status symbol in a way b)they wanted them originally for security c) and because people no longer have to live in communal apartments they actually have some space for pets. Another observation here, despite everyone living in apartments (no one has a detached house here like people have in North America, most people live in tall apartment buildings), is that there are dogs of all sizes. We have seen poodles in carrying bags, Dachshunds wading around in the snow, Dobermans, and even a brindled Great Dane (my favorite!) the other day while walking through the park on the way home. (Elisa we have even seen quite a few of Foxy’s cousins, it appears as though the Finish Spitz is a popular breed here) Most of the pets we have seen look as though they are well taken care of too, some wearing coats others fitted with boots, but occasionally we see rather sad looking ones which I try to forget about.

Museum Madness Part 2

The Russian Museum – aka the Mikhailovsky Palace:
Built between 1812 and 1825 for Grand Duke Mikhail Romanov, this is the consolation prize I was talking about before . . . it was built for him since he, unlike his brothers Alexander I and Nicholas I, never became tsar. Eventually, under Nicholas II this palace was opened to the public in 1898 as a gallery housing Russian artwork. Today, unlike the Hermitage, its collections are made up of only Russian pieces. The palace itself, which is located in the heart of St. Petersburg (only a block away from Gostiny Dvor, and Dom Knigi and Nevsky Prospect) and shares a central park with the Mikhailovsky Theatre where we saw The Nutcracker on Valentine’s Day last week, is a massive (yet again these Russian royals with super extravagant homes), grand looking building, (about the colour of Mom’s, and Uncle David and Aunt Shirley’s Kitchens), with tall white columns and a pair of lion statues flanking the main entrance’s stairs. Inside, spread throughout the rooms on both floors of the original building, and throughout the additional wing which was constructed in the early 1900’s are the museum’s collections. Firstly, we wandered through their rooms of religious icons! Russian churches and cathedrals are quite extravagantly decked out in artwork of the various orthodox saints, as well as numerous biblical figures, and these rooms contained some examples of these. We saw images of: the Crucifixion, the Nativity, and many different portrayals of Christ throughout his life; numerous depictions of Peter and Paul, at least half a dozen of the angel Gabriel, numerous of the Virgin Mary, and others. After these rooms, we entered the early 18th Century rooms which mostly housed portraits, and sculptures of various famous (and some not so famous, “unknown man”) Russian figures, as well as some depictions of mythological characters. Next were the pieces from the first half of the 19th Century and I think both Ross and I enjoyed this part of the collection the most. Again many portraits, often of people we didn’t know, so we didn’t have too much interest in these, but there were dozens and dozens of beautiful landscapes and other fantastic paintings. One of these being, “The Last Day of Pompeii” by Karl Brullov (1833), considered to be the “most important work – in the whole history of Russian painting.” It is a massive canvas depicting a scene of the citizens of Pompeii in the last few chaotic hours of the city following the eruption of the volcano (impossible for me to describe in detail since I am not up with proper terminology on art but we bought a very nice guidebook which has a great picture of it, so ask to see it when I get home). Some of my favorite pieces were those of Ilya Repin, an artist from the later 19th Century including “Ceremonial Sitting of the State Council on 7 May 1901 Marking the Centenary of its Foundation” (in a nutshell a very important meeting, and seated at the head of the table is Nicholas II); a beautiful painting of a couple waste deep in the rising surf of the ocean, she is struggling to keep her hat on her head, but he has his arms flailed out and looks to be enjoying himself immensely (again sorry for my simple explanations) called “What an Expanse!,” and lastly, perhaps my favorite, a painting of the 1905 Revolution showing a crowd of protestors waving banners and chanting, called “17 October 1905.” All in all it is a magnificent museum which you could easily spend days pouring over if you were more educated in art than I am. I definitely appreciated most of what we saw and thoroughly enjoyed the three or four hours we spent there. I may have to go back again before we leave to look through some of my favorite rooms again. (P.S. again the architecture was of greater interest to me than some of the art, think me crazy if you want to, but just wait until you see the photos in the guidebooks and you will get it. These people lived in houses that are artworks in and of themselves. I wonder if they really appreciated it?)

The Nutcracker – Tchaikovsky
Going to the ballet in Russia is just one of those experiences it Is fun to say you have had so we bought tickets at the school last week and last night saw Tchaikovsky’s the Nutcracker performed at the Mikhailovsky Theatre. Ok so the Mikhailovsky may not be as well known as Petersburg’s Mariinsky Theatre or Moscow’s Bolshoi Theatre, but it was pretty fantastic nonetheless. It would be almost impossible for me to explain what the theatre looked like, so I will attach one of the photos we took so that you can get a better visualization. We got all dressed up, with Laura and Jessi too, and Ross called and booked us a cab long in advance so that we would have plenty of time to get there. We learned from our friends’ experience that this was a good idea because, the other night when they were supposed to have seen Swan Lake at the same theatre, they tried to order a taxi an hour before they wanted to leave, and it was too late. Then they tried to run to the metro and take that to the theatre, but they arrived 10 minutes after the ballet had started so they weren’t allowed into the theatre. We did not want to risk arriving late. We actually ended up arriving about an hour before the performance so Ross and I were able to buy a snack (really good open-faced sandwiches, his with a type of Kolbasa, tomato and mustard, and mine with cheese and red caviar yum!). The only downside to being there so early was that we had plenty of time to realize that we had over dressed! We were under the impression that going out to a theatre was one of those many dress up occasions here, and we have been told a few times that Russians all like to get dressed up when they go out, but we saw people in jeans, little kids in hooded sweaters, and all in all stood out quite a bit. The performance itself was awesome, what we could see of it that is! For the first act, the people sitting in front of us were positioned so that we could easily see most of the stage, but during the second act, they had all switched seats (they were a group of students and their teacher from France) and the main teacher, who was constantly snapping her fingers (no idea why) and waving to her students across the theatre, sat right in front of me, sat as tall as she possibly could, and then moved around as often as possible so I couldn’t see a thing. About ten minutes into the second act, I decided to stand up (we were on the isle and there was only one row of seats behind us and then just empty risers between them and the door). I actually wish I had been standing for the entire performance because I could see the entire stage. Other people, who didn’t have tickets were allowed to stand as well, I believe without paying (probably people who had shown up that night wanting tickets and were told that the show was sold out), but they definitely had a great view! Far better than my seat in the second row on the second balcony, and I am sure far better than those on the top balcony, or the people who were seated behind me.

History and Erotica

Hello Everyone!
Since our last post we have seen a few more sites of the city. We’ve been trying to fit a few in every week so that over the course of our time here we’ll have been able to visit everything that we wanted.
Aquarium! While neither Leah nor I knew that St. Petersburg had an aquarium (or an Oceanarium as they call it here), and although aquariums aren’t a particularly Russian experience, we spent a relaxing Saturday afternoon under the sea so to speak. The aquarium is all indoors, and was built in 2006 so it is very modern. Leah and I were both very impressed at how well the fish were kept, and how clean and big the tanks were. In fact, we would even go as far as saying that it was better than the Vancouver Aquarium. The tanks are divided into different regional areas. For example, the fish at the beginning of the exhibits are from around this area, then follows a tropical rainforest/freshwater section, and finally on the lower floor was an extensive ocean reef section. Our favorite exhibits included a massive open water tank about waist deep which we could even lean over to see its inhabitants. It contained a large number of stingrays, which swam right up close, so that if we had wanted, we could have reached over and touched them as their “wings” (fins I suppose) came out of the water. The most popular section of the aquarium is a horseshoe shaped tunnel that is surrounded on all sides and above by sharks, fish, coral, eels and all such ocean critters. Leah’s other favorite tank was one that contained seahorses. She did not like the sharks….although we have a picture of her in the jaws of a Megalodon (for all you museum folk who know what that is).

Following our excursion to the Oceanarium, we decided to treat ourselves to dinner at…….McDonalds! For some reason or another, despite never craving it at home, the five of us who went were all inexplicably longing for a McDonald’s burger. Another thing…for some strange reason, in every country in the world outside of North America McDonalds is actually good. The service is good, the restaurants have leather seats, they are clean, and the food is actually tasty. After struggling our way through ordering (the poor guy at the front had to deal with 5 foreigners with broken Russian), we sat down at a table near the door, only to have an uninvited guest soon join us at the head of our table; no it was not a rat, rather a sad old babushka (grandmother) who was waiting by the garbage can to eat any food that someone was going to throw out. We felt very sorry for her, especially since the 5 of us were eating full meals: burgers, fries and beverages. Let us explain. During the Soviet Union, when health care was free, retirees had pensions, and the state controlled the prices of necessities, everyone was reasonably well taken care of. But, when the Soviet Union collapsed, everyone who was receiving a pension, or who would soon receive a pension, lost everything. Now, because of rapid inflation, and a re-evaluation of the currency (the exchange rate was 1000 Soviet Rubles to the new Russian Ruble), everyone’s savings were wiped out. On top of that, as a new country, Russia was unable to provide social welfare programs that they had been able to provide before, so the older generation is left with meager savings, and since they are unable to work, must rely on charity and what little the state can provide them. Looking at this old women, who we were sure would have survived World War 2 and the Siege of Leningrad, Stalin’s reign, the collapse of her country, and the building of a drastically different Russia, we were reminded of how lucky we are. So, we decided that given our luck in life and prosperity, to give her a couple hundred rubles to hopefully make her life a little easier. After a brief argument (she was too proud to take it at first) she eventually relented and thanked us very much and wished us all good health. As a bonus, perhaps this will leave her with a positive impression of young foreigners as well.

Today, like every Monday, while all the other classes are forced to go to school, our group gets a day off (we are divided into classes based on our level of Russian and while some classes get Fridays, or Tuesdays off, our extra day of rest is Monday). The weather was particularly fantastic today, about four degrees Celsius, (the snow has all melt) so we decided not to waste it. We left the hotel around eleven or so this morning and first headed downtown. We took the subway, got off at our stop and headed in the direction of the Hermitage Museum (the old Winter Palace built in the 1730’s). The building was constructed by Empress Elizabeth who unfortunately died before it was completed, and so Peter the third was the first to live there. He however only lived there for three months, because a coup occurred which replaced him with the Palace’s next inhabitant Catherine the Great! On the way to the Hermitage, we had some lunch (KFC! Ridiculous I know! We have been eating Russian food too I promise you) and then continued on to the museum . . . which was closed! We had forgotten that it was Monday, thinking it was still Sunday, and unfortunately our day of rest is also the Hermitage’s day of rest. Our walk there was not for nothing however, because we snapped some beautiful pictures of the building itself, as well as the square in front of it, which has a large monument in the centre. The monument was built to commemorate the defeat of Napoleon in 1812. It is a huge 47.5 meter tall pillar of granite which it topped with a statue of an angel who is trampling a snake (the snake is a common symbol here of an invading force). After being denied a day in the museum, we decided to continue on our trek to some of the other nearby sights. About a block or so away, stands the Bronze Horseman statue, which is a monument dedicated to Peter the Great from his wife Catherine I (not to be confused with Catherine II who was “the Great”). . . See picture. The statue is of Peter himself riding a horse which is trampling a snake (again symbolic of invaders). The park in which the statue sits looks out onto the Neva River (the main campus of St. Petersburg State University is on the opposite bank), is across the street, on one side, from the Constitutional Court buildings, and also across from St. Isaac’s Cathedral (who is the patron saint of St. Petersburg because he and Peter the Great share the same birthday). It is a massive cathedral with a golden domed roof and gorgeous statues and pillars decorating it, and was the first church built in the city. We took photos of the horseman and the church, but intend to visit the church again later because we discovered that inside is a museum, and you can also ascend to the top of the cathedral where we are told there is a fantastic view of the city.

After taking in these sights, we still had some time until we had planned to meet up with Jessi and Laura to go see another museum, so we did some souvenir shopping. We found a great bookstore, where we bought a fantastic book of soviet propaganda posters! Definitely a great conversation piece which will live on our coffee table back home. We also poked around in a couple of souvenir shops which had everything from matroshkas ( ‘nesting’ dolls as we call them in Canada) and shot glasses, to watercolour paintings of the city and jewelry, but we didn’t find anything we needed to have immediately.

Eventually, we made our way back to the metro, and then to the station nearest our school so that we could meet up with Jessi and Laura. On the way to the institute, we stopped at a Teremok kiosk which is a chain of restaurants here that has both kiosks and restaurants serving Russian foods. We each ordered Blini: they are thin little pancakes, similar to crepes which Russians eat with various kinds of toppings. Ross’ had caramelized apples, and mine was chocolate (although Elisa I really should have had mine with that condensed milk stuff, which by the way we have found in everything . . . to everyone else, I will explain that later when I write a full blog on Russian foods we have been eating, stay tuned). However normal these toppings may sound, they also eat these thin folded pancakes with mushrooms, various meats and cheeses, as well as with onions and other random things. After this quick snack we met up with Jessi and Laura and continued on to our final site for the day . . .

The Museum of Erotica! Housed in a former centre of venereal diseases, now a fully functional, modern proctology/”prostate-ology”/gynecology clinic (as the sign out front also reads), the Museum of Erotica is essentially a collection of rather tacky, sexually themed objects which are displayed on the walls of the clinic. Meanwhile, as we are observing the collection, patients were checking in, filling out forms, and waiting to see their doctors. The showpiece of the entire collection, and the sole reason why we bothered to go at all (aside from the laughs of course), is a rather disturbing (ask to see the photo when we come home) jar which contains . . . Rasputin’s Penis! (allegedly) Not sure if this can be believed or not, considering the circumstances of his death. At any rate, given our interest in Russian History, that Rasputin is somewhat of a legend himself within the larger scope of Russian History, and simply to say that we have seen all that remains of him, we had to go and see it!
Bye for now, From Russia With Love: Ross and Leah

Lenin and the ballet

Ballet! Today after our classes finished and we were getting our coats from the coat check at Smolny (yes, we have a coat check complete with a nice old lady that gives you a number and smiles) there was a cute little babushka (grandmother) who was sitting in the lobby with a bunch of tickets to the Mikhailovsky Theatre, a map of the theatre’s seating, and numerous posters. At first we completely ignored her requests to “smotri! pazhalusta!” (look, please), until we became curious and took another look at her tickets (yes they are authentic). Ballets included the likes of the Nutcracker, Swan Lake and a few others. After looking at the prices (she was selling the tickets at cost) and the seating (really awesome seats) we decided to go ahead and buy a bunch of tickets. Leah and I bought tickets to the Nutcracker for Valentines Day, and our roommates Laura and Jessi also bought tickets to the Nutcracker, while Natasha and Erin purchased tickets to Swan Lake. We are all looking forward to dressing up and becoming part of St. Petersburg’s high society for an evening.

Finland Station
After buying our tickets from the old lady we then began another adventure…..to pay homage to Lenin! After walking to the Metro station we normally take home, we took the route to Finland Station where Lenin arrived from Finland and gave his famous speech that ignited the 1917 Revolution. After exiting the metro station you walk out to see a massive square, and at the end, stands a large statue of Lenin (see picture). The square has been taken care of and even had sand on the ice to prevent slipping (a rarity in St. Petersburg), and there were numerous carnations that had been placed at the base of the monument. We took some photos and then entered the train station and after a bit of a confusion trying to find out where exactly the train car was, we found it complete and encased in a large glass box on the actual train platform.

Russia Two

Television: We have a old and suffering black and white TV in our room here which is able to pick up only 7 channels total out of the hundreds available. Occassionally we have been watching Russian television to practice our listening skills and we have stumbled upon some interesting shows. Games shows (like Taxi- below), dramas like our soap operas (which are hard to understand because there is only speaking not really actions or settings from which we can understand through context, news, and even reality tv (a show called Dom 2 or House 2 which is kind of like our Big Brother or the Real World).

Taxi - Is an awesome game show that we have been watching which is on every weeknight at 7 o'clock (like Jeopardy or Wheel of Fortune at home). The show is somewhat similar to Who Wants to Be a Millionaire in that contestants are asked questions which are worth a certain amount of money, and the more questions they answer correctly the more money they accumulate. The show is set in St. Petersburg, and begins as a Taxi pulls up to two people, and instead of negotiating a fare, which is common practice here, the driver accepts the passenger's first offer and so they get in. As the door closes however, lights begin flashing on the ceiling of the van, and the driver/host turns around and introduces the show. As he drives them to their desintation he asks them questions (true false, multiple choice, general questions) and for every one they answer correctly he gives them 200 rubles. Sometimes he asks them to name the singer of a song he is playing, sometimes a screen pops down from the ceiling with a picture on it and he asks them to identify who/what/where the photo is of. The contestants are given three strikes so to speak before they are eliminated and they also get two "life-lines," one of which allows them to call a friend on their cellphone, the other allows them to pull over and ask a stranger on the street for help. Once they arrive at their destination there is generally a final bonus question which allows them to double their money. The show is very entertaining despite not being able to understand all of what is said because the people and the host are always very animated and excited. The host, is always cracking jokes, is very lively - reminds me of Howie Mandel (especially since he is bald).

Ikea: This weekend we and our flat mates (plus Jacob who lives downstairs) took a trip to IKEA which is on the outskirts of St. Petersburg at the end of one of the metro lines (there are actually two IKEAs,on opposite ends of the city in the middle of nowhere. On one side of the highway we could see small industrial buildings but on the other nothing, except for a power plant in the distance which was probably nuclear). We took two metro lines to get there, and then a bus (which is free, provided by IKEA) and finally arrived at the huge IKEA which is attached to a massive shopping mall (looks exactly like any mall in Canada, Sephora, Macdonalds, Esprit, and many more European stores). We all ate lunch at the IKEA cafeteria and then continued on through IKEA. Because the blankets in our apartments are made of wool, and since I am allergic to wool, the first thing on my list was a duvet or other blanket. Ross and I bought a duvet, its sheets, a set of knives (one of which we traded to Laura for two plastic bowls), a pair of cutting boards (one of which we traded to Laura for two of her plastic cups), a pot, etc . . . and it all ended up costing us about 80$ Canadian! I always knew that IKEA was reasonably priced, but IKEA in Russia is awesome! We learned today from one of our professors that the reason for this is because of where it is located. Apparently because it is situated so far from the centre of the city, it is not even within the St.Petersburg region. It is actually in the nearby Leningrad Oblast which has significantly lower taxes than St. Petersburg and therefore goods are more inexpensive.

Ross' Friend Xie Fei: On one of our first days here, Ross and I met a student from China who is also studying at Smolny (Ross astounded him, by speaking to him in Chinese instead of Russian or English). On Friday night, we were feeling lazy, and some what celebratory, so we decided that we wanted to go out to eat dinner so Natasha Ross and I went downstairs to ask Xie Fie if a nearby Chinese restaurant was any good. We ended up inviting him to join us, luckily too! because the menu was only in Chinese and Russian so it took our meager Russian and Xie Fie and Ross' Chinese to translate the menu. We ended up ordering dumplings, wonton soup, peppered mushroom squid, a chicken dish with tomatos, cucumbers, pineapple (not for Deanne at all) in a sweet sauce, and a beef dish with potato and peppers. All very excellent! But once we were finished, Xie Fei went up to get our bill and without us knowing paid for all of our meals! We insisted on paying him for our portions but he won out eventually saying that it was his treat to celebrate the Chinese New Year (Jan. 26th), we agreed but intend to take him out for dinner sometime soon.

Note: The photo at the top of this entry is a church in the centre of the city called "The Church-On-Spilled-Blood" or the Church of the Resurection, it is called the Church-on-spilled-blood because it was built as a monument to Alexander II who was assassinated on the spot where the church stands now. We have not gone into the church yet, but apparently somewhere inside there is an area of the floor where you can still see the stain of his blood.

Poka! (bye for now) Leah and Ross